Kirsten Powers has gone from being a thoughtful center-leftist to a shrill smear-meister (or is that smear-mistress?). A few weeks ago, Megyn Kelly smacked her down — smacked her down hard and well — when Powers dared to go on Fox to discuss the New Black Panther voter intimidation case without more than a cursory knowledge of the issue. Powers, beaten, pulled out the race card, accusing Kelly of hyping the idea of “scary black men” for ratings, or something like that.

Now she has gone farther. Now she is accusing the entire Republican Party (or is it the entire political right?) with ginning up racism. Methinks she has a hangup with scary white men.

For the record: I have now written nearly 40 editorials, columns and blog posts on the Panther situation AND the issues growing from it. It is incontrovertible that in terms of old-fashioned print, I have done more than any single person to highlight the issue. (Many others who I have named here have written ground-breaking stuff on this subject, repeatedly, online and in some print outlets, chief among them Jennifer Rubin, Hans von Spakovsky and Michelle Malkin, some of which were far better than my own pieces.) So, as a prime mover of the issue, I take charges of racism very personally even if she doesn’t know I exist (which she probably doesn’t). So, then, herewith a statement and a challenge:

Statement: The focus on the Panther case by the right stems from ZERO racist motivations. None. Indeed, it is a response to a racialist application of the law, on a topic we, or at least I, personally wish had never arisen and that I believe this nation should long ago have moved beyond.

Challenge: I will put my record of time, energy, effectiveness, sweat, and almost blood, on behalf of civil rights and the political causes of black Americans, up against that of Ms. Powers — any day, any time, anywhere. I’ve detailed my record on this front several times in this space. I urge her to do some research before she takes the challenge.

Meanwhile, before she slings charges of racism around like confetti at a Yankees’ World Series championship parade, Ms. Powers might want to swallow her bile, rein in her impulses toward cheap shots, and …. stifle herself.